


A Life For A Life

by rvst



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: F/F, Other, Royalty AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-01
Updated: 2015-08-01
Packaged: 2018-04-12 10:29:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4475981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rvst/pseuds/rvst
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Allison did her duty, she saw that now, as her life slipped through her fingers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Life For A Life

The depths of the forest usually didn't bother Lydia. A wayward childhood ducking royal babysitters and the royal guard to run free and wild gave her a detailed mental map of its well-worn trails and paths. For example, she knew for a fact that there was a barely there creek off in the distance to her left. Neither of her companions had this same level of foreknowledge about the site for the probably doomed quest. They didn't need to know how well-versed the princess was in the ways of the forest, though she tutted at them internally for not guessing.

 

The entire reason for their late night stroll should have given them a massive clue.

 

Her reluctant new personal bodyguard and her personal scribe knew her history, and how closely linked their goal was to it. Stories spread like wildfire throughout the kingdom about the young princess dragging a hunter out of the wooded areas next to her supposedly secure castle home suddenly one day without any warning or explanation. Surely Malia and Kira had heard the gossip, how the princess was offering herself to the hunter clan's princess as human leverage for peace with the rebellious group.

 

It wasn't her intention, but Allison ordered her family to stand the hell down anyway, without Lydia asking and at great personal risk.

 

Lydia squared her shoulders, hoping that neither of her girls noticed how low her mood was getting, it wouldn't do. They were both more than experienced with death and pain, so she really felt the guilt pile on when she was hit the worst by their collective loss.

 

Malia led them along a barely-there trail worn into the ground. The red ribbon tied to her right shoulder plate looked wrong to Lydia's eyes. It wasn't that the younger woman didn't do the job and do it well. Malia had stopped no less than seven threats to Lydia's life in the last three days alone. To anyone else, she was handling the responsibility forced upon her without a break in stride. To Lydia and no doubt Kira as well, Malia's entire right side seemed to slump over with the weight of the light fabric.

 

Kira kept abnormally close to Lydia's side, something she had been doing almost constantly since, well since it happened. Her keen eyes seemed to be searching Lydia for signs of breaking down, of giving up the unaffected front she put on for the benefit of the kingdom and indeed Allison's family as well. Kira was right in front of her along with Malia as Chris Argent came barging into her reception room, demanding to know why she had let this happen to his daughter.

 

At night, Kira held Lydia close and tight, not letting her grip slacken at any point throughout the night. Malia barely slept, taking to guarding outside their bedroom door, eyes searching for threats that were there, hiding in the shadows and waiting to take the princess as they took her protector.

 

Neither were taking Allison's death well, and they had the nerve to treat her like she would shatter at the slightest disturbance.

 

Malia's already slow pace drew to a crawl. Lydia rolled her eyes, her most idiotic idiot had no clue where she was going. As they didn't have that much time before their window closed, Lydia decided to relinquish her mysterious airs and concealment of knowledge for just one night. They pair of them had more than earned it over their last year of service, and the long months of slow romance led to a trust she'd only found with one other person.

 

"We need to go left at the next fork, then follow it until we pass a waterfall," Lydia broke the silence of their lengthy walk. Malia immediately tripped over a tree root while Kira pressed herself into Lydia's side instinctively. "Graceful as ever dear."

 

Malia swore, a lot. "You know where we are?" Kira winced as their girlfriend yelled. Lydia hummed in disapproval, an outburst like that would only draw some of the more dangerous inhabitants of the forest directly to them. "And you didn't mention this earlier?" Malia continued at a relatively quiet volume. It would still draw creatures of the night to them, but maybe not the entire damn forest.

 

"Mean," Kira hissed. Lydia kissed her cheek, placating her for the moment. She held out a hand to her fallen knight, trying not to look smug as Malia drew level with her eyes.

 

"Have you been to the grove before?" Malia asked, uncharacteristically hushed and small. Her usually bursting energy had been sapped away by taking over Allison's job, killing people for the first time since she was a child. "Why?"

 

Lydia cleared her throat and squeezed the hand still clutched in her own. "Allison took me there on what I suppose you could call our first date," she explained, "she hopefully wasn't aware of what it is beyond really pretty."

 

Malia squeezed back, grunting in agreement. Kira took hold of her other hand, lacing their fingers together and resting her head on Lydia's shoulder. "This will work right?"

 

Malia shrugged, letting go of Lydia's hand and turning to stare into the darkness. Lydia rubbed her thumb over the back of Kira's hand, attempting to reassure her lover. Malia took off, keeping a much quicker pace now she knew where she was going.

 

Lydia pulled Kira along with her, taking care to keep their hands connected. If it made her happy to be close to Lydia, ostensibly comforting the princess, then Lydia decided to let her have it. Giving in to her girlfriend wouldn't hurt, and her hand was warm while the night was cold. Lydia and Kira didn't have the warm armour Malia wore nearly perpetually nowadays, so sharing the warmth was only logical, right?

 

"One more hour," Lydia whispered to herself, heart clutching in anticipation. Allison, it screamed. It begged for her back, not content with letting her go. "Just one more hour."

 

 

* * *

 

 

Lydia felt the grove before it came into view. Beside her, Kira squirmed with a discomfort she probably couldn't put a name to. Malia barely broke stride as the wave of energy hit her, though Lydia watched the muscles in her arms tense in anticipation of a fight.

 

At face value, the grove itself was barely noticeable, especially from a distance. Over the centuries, travellers and hunters had spread stories about the monsters that lived in this little clearing in the otherwise dense forest. Lydia knew that the monsters were just stones, big ones. They were arranged by persons unknown into a rough circle, which intimidated the supposedly modern people. The carefully carved stone slab directly in the middle of the haphazard circular treeline was the only real indication that people had been here before. The standing stones could have formed naturally, however unlikely that was, but the massive piece of stone in the grove couldn't be anything but man-made. It wasn't possible.

 

Kira pulled away, done with her fidgeting and fear. She explored more boldly than either of her lovers, careful to catalogue every inch of the clearing with a dedication that could only be acquired working on paperwork all day everyday. Lydia smiled fondly at her quick but thorough examination. Malia placed a hand on her sword, carefully keeping her eyes fixed to Kira in case anything came out of the trees to attack her. Lydia's heart warmed despite their reasons for being here, grateful that her two loves stayed by her side after the passing of their fourth. For a brief moment at the state funeral, Lydia's distraught mind pushed the idea that they would leave her now that Allison was gone.

 

Kira knelt on both of her knees, gloved hand reaching forward to brush dirt and weeds away from whatever she had found. Malia shared an apprehensive glance with the princess, her grip tightening on her sword as she made her way over to the scribe while attempting to keep Lydia in the corner of her eye. The worry clear in her expression brought tension through Lydia's body, though she was careful not to give it away to either of them, they needed to focus, not worry about her.

 

"This looks suitably ancient and confusing," called Kira just loud enough for the approaching Malia and the still motionless Lydia to hear her words. "Is this it?"

 

Lydia took measured steps towards her girlfriend, passing Malia as she stopped to inspect the giant stone slab, and came to kneel next to Kira. She didn't care one bit about getting her clothes dirty, which was a nice change from her usual perpetual worry about appearances.

 

The flat, rectangular piece of what had to be granite had the right type of carvings in it to be what they were looking for, and Lydia was the only one to study this ritual in the deepest depths of the castle's library. She examined it in great detail, knowing that the grove had more than one false tablet to mislead the uninformed attempting to resurrect their lost loved ones. The false ones would only lead to the grove using its magical energies to lash out at everyone in the vicinity so Lydia was sure to check it twice and then another three times for good measure.

 

Malia gave up on her examination of the central slab, wandering off to skirt their perimeter. The younger woman was buckling under the weight of responsibility, though only Lydia and Kira could really see it happening. There was almost nothing they could do to reverse the harsh change in their girlfriend. Almost.

 

"Are you sure about this?" Kira asked, barely above a whisper. Lydia reached for her hand and found it to be shaking. "There are so many ways that this could go wrong, starting with nothing happening."

 

Kira turned her eyes deliberately to Malia's stalking form, Lydia caught her meaning. "She'll be okay, even if it doesn't work. I'll think of something," she reassured, considering for the first time that failure was a very real possibility. Lydia didn't trust anyone outside of her very tight inner-circle. Allison had served as her personal bodyguard for the better part of a decade and Malia was the only other person she trusted enough with the ability to do the job. Every other warrior around her could be bribed or blackmailed.

 

Trailing off from the tablet, Lydia considered Kira as a potential temporary replacement. The other woman was a more than capable warrior despite her years of sedentary desk work. Kira could do it, but that would just shift the crushing weight and Lydia would be without her best adviser and scribe. Her official duties as princess and primary foreign ambassador would collapse without Kira by her side.

 

A heavy thump pulled their attention away from Malia's mental state to the woman herself. She crouched to go through the bag of ritual paraphernalia Lydia had Kira assemble over the last few weeks in preparation for their little trip into the forest. "Can we please just get this over and done with? I don't like it out here," Malia stressed, eyes flicking around her like a trapped animal.

 

This represented a complete about-face for Lydia's wild-woman. A worrying one. "No one is out here, sweetie. Just us and the bugs," Lydia tried to sooth her girlfriend. Malia stopped her panicked movements at least, though she didn't stop trying to be aware of everything around them.

 

"Yeah well the bugs bite so can we?" Malia would have stomped her foot if she were any less mature. "God knows what's out there."

 

"Hunters, werewolves, probably another werecoyote, other fun things," Kira teased, achieving nothing but making Malia frown.

 

Lydia gave in to Malia's concerns, shaking her head at the clearly incorrect carvings on the tablet. "This isn't the right one," she said, prompting Kira to resume her search. Lydia set to work pulling the equipment out of the bag, taking deep breaths to keep her cool even as Malia finally gave in to her urges and drew her sword in a precautionary measure.

 

Keep them busy and they won't notice how scared you are, Lydia told herself. Kira would find the right tablet and then Allison would be back. It was as simple as that, and Lydia couldn't wait to see her again. Malia was staring at her suspiciously, so she refocused her attention on the magical equipment she needed to perform the ritual.

 

“What about that one?” Malia called, pointing to the ground next to her without a glance towards her find. “Looks about the same.”

 

Lydia carefully picked her way through the tree roots running throughout the grove to where her overly dismissive lover stood. Malia had clearly barely looked at it for which Lydia was eternally grateful. There was always the off chance that Malia could throw her plan out of balance, Kira too if Lydia was being honest with herself. It was her own fault for getting involved with such intelligent women in the first place.

 

Without making eye contact, Lydia knelt next to the tablet in the ground and began her work as Malia wandered off and Kira continued her inspection of the incorrect tablet.

 

Lydia hoped they could both forgive her for this.

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

The ground rumbled beneath their feet, one of the beautifully carved rocks falling over and shattering into glowing pieces. Lydia held her breath, the urge to scream suffocating in her throat. Across the grove, Kira had collapsed, though Lydia couldn't figure out if it was from pain or passing out or falling over due to the spontaneous earthquake. Malia had disappeared entirely, which was infinitely more worrying.

 

She couldn't lose anyone else.

 

"Malia!" Kira screamed from her position on the ground. She was alive at least, and had a better view on whatever happened to their other girlfriend. Lydia opened her mouth to yell back, to ask what was going on, anything but her breathless terror.

 

The platform exploded. The glowing purple chunks going flying far and wide, narrowly missing Lydia's head. She dived out of the way, grateful for the first time that she had taken a pair of pants from Allison's dormant wardrobe before they set out. To think she was going to resurrect the dead wearing one of her cute but impractical skirts. Insanely, Lydia managed to find the brainpower to wonder if women could wear kilts, they seemed like action friendly skirts and the patterns weren't exactly terrible given some nice colouring.

 

The world stopped shaking. Kira was back on her feet and stumbling around debris towards the centre of the grove, her legs unstable underneath her body. Malia was still out of Lydia's sight, though her other girlfriend didn't seem as worried as she was a moment ago. Lydia registered these facts about the situation with a detached interest. Like it wasn't happening around her and she was watching a play acted before her. She liked the theatre. The first thing she did after convincing Allison to come home with her was take the hunter into her favourite play. Allison went along, aloof and yielding as ever. Lydia loved Allison, where did she go?

 

The energy was flowing out of her body, taking from her vitality as much as it needed to work. Lydia didn't care, she wanted Allison back.

 

During her reading on the subject of resurrection, Lydia had come across numerous stories of the process being successful. The person back exactly as they were before, the love required to complete the ritual doing its job and no terrible horrible side effects such as demonic possession or an dead mind in a living body. As her strength left her, she recalled the one piece of information common to every last ritual performed without a hitch. The consequences, the price, the fine print.

 

When the runes suggested a commitment needing to be laid out for the spirits or gods or whatever was powering the stones in the grove to be appeased, the agreement demanded the living to be willing to give their life for their dead love.

 

Lydia was apparently the only person to ever stumble upon the ritual and taking this particular caveat exactly how it was meant, literally. The accounts were full of crying ladies and broken knights pledging to die at the hands of enemies or diseases, or whatever killed their person. They all considered it to be a verbal agreement, marriage vows from the supernatural side of the world, a test of love. Lydia saw it for what it really said.

 

A very real promise. Yes, I'll die for just a few more moments with you. My life for yours, one person transferring their life energy to the other. Simple, cold and unforgiving numbers. A trade.

 

Her legs gave out, and she felt her life draining.

 

Malia appeared, standing where Lydia had tactically placed herself when they first arrived in the grove. She was bleeding from a gash on her cheek, though she ignored it as she knelt to inspect the stone tablet Lydia had spent the entire ritual standing upon. Continuing to amaze Lydia, her eyes flicked over the runes in comprehension that only came with being able to understand the near-dead language fluently. Lydia tried to summon the energy to crawl away, to escape before the accusation and heartbreak happened. Her previous certainty fled, the guilt she felt at causing Allison's death suddenly seeming small.

 

Allison did her duty, she saw that now, as her life slipped through her fingers.

 

Malia placed both her hands on the tablet as Kira all but collapsed in between them. Features clouded with confusion, she looked back and forth between her loves, not sure if Lydia's delirious expression or Malia's bleeding face was a greater concern. She didn't have a chance to decide, Malia making the choice for her.

 

"Come here, you idiot," she snapped at Kira, her hands glowing against the cold of the stone. Lydia could barely lift her head, though she had an excellent view of the centre of the grove. Kira fell next to Malia and listened closely. Lydia couldn't hear them, and her heart used some of its precious remaining time to stab and throb, begging to say goodbye to them, to tell them she loved them. To beg for forgiveness, anything but the silence.

 

Then it was all okay.

 

White light, bright against the darkness of the early morning. It formed in the middle of the assorted stones, pulling inward and growing brighter by the moment. Lydia smiled, Kira and Malia fading from her awareness with a fleeting farewell and two new wells of emptiness inside her heart. She wished she had longer, but the light was coalescing into a very familiar form.

 

Allison was back. She would take care of their loves, she would. Duty and honour and love and commitment. Lydia knew Allison would take care of them, she would use the contract left on her desk to take Lydia's position as heir-apparent. Malia, Kira, and the kingdom would be okay in her hands. Lydia trusted her more than she trusted herself, she was the better option for the one life force they had left between them.

 

Brown hair and bloody clothes came into view clearly, the light fading. Lydia felt her heart stop. The thundering in her ears going silent for the first time since they arrived. The quiet was nice.

 

"You stay the hell awake!" Malia was yelling at her, mean. She wanted to be warm again, Allison was alive, she could see her chest rising and falling as her own lungs stopped functioning.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Lydia woke to a hand running through her hair. Leaning into it, she wanted nothing more than to go back to sleep, but the owner of the hand pulled at her hair, keeping her awake and moderately aware.

 

“Why?” Lydia whined, squirming in the impossibly soft bed she had awoken in.

 

“You pissed off Malia so bad, she's threatening to leave the kingdom,” came Kira's voice off in the distance. “Something about no-one trying to actively get themselves killed in the wilds, and Allison has guards following her everywhere, and I haven't been to my own bed for five days, so you can fucking wake the hell up, princess!”

 

Lydia cracked open an eye. Kira definitely hadn't been to bed in days. “You look terrible,” she observed, reaching out to caress Kira's drawn face. “I mean that in the best possible way, of course.”

 

Kira's angry steam ran out instantly, melting into the contact with Lydia's hand. “I know,” she agreed.

 

“Is Malia seriously going to leave?”

 

Kira grinned. “She's just worried. Allison's got her, because Allison is all alive again and stuff,” she pointed out yet again, nudging Lydia's shoulder. Lydia watched as her girlfriend practically vibrated with excitement in her seat. “Cool, huh? And you're alive, and Malia's cranky but alive, and I'm going to pass out, but still alive!”

 

“We did good, I get it,” Lydia stopped the elated babbling before it could really get going. No-one needed that, especially an already hassled medical staff. “Can princess get a kiss?”

 

Kira leaned down, lightly pressing their lips together. She then promptly lost consciousness on top of Lydia and all was right with the world. Lydia used her meagre remaining strength, returning more by the second, to leverage the rest of Kira's worn-out body onto the bed beside her.

 

When Allison came to the medical wing of the castle hours later dragging Malia by her ear, Lydia had both arms curled protectively over the kitsune, clinging onto her like a koala bear.

 

“Leaving?” Allison asked Malia, releasing her ear for the first time in over half an hour. Malia grumbled childishly as her newly-resurrected girlfriend went to join the pile.

 

She sighed, following behind Allison and dragging her feet. “I can't leave while they're asleep! That would be rude!”

 

Diving onto the bed, Lydia and Kira were shocked awake by Malia's surprisingly heavy body. Allison threw her head back and laughed with the freedom of new life and her family surrounding her.

 


End file.
